| Books by Hal Higdon Third Edition: |
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The third edition of Hal Higdon's best-selling running book, Marathon: The Ultimate Training Guide, is ready. It contains more than 370 pages vs. 230 pages in the second edition. This is truly a new book, one that you will want to add to your running library even if you own either the first or second editions of this best-selling book. Following is an excerpt from Marathon: The Ultimate Training Guide.
Introduction: MARATHONING FOR A NEW MILLENNIUM
ON A SUNNY AFTERNOON IN JUNE, I went for a run in Oak Forest, a suburb southwest of Chicago. It was a Wednesday in the 2nd week of my 18-week training program leading to the LaSalle Bank Chicago Marathon in October. That morning, along with thousands of other runners using my programs to train for Chicago, I had received an e-mail message (from myself) telling me to run 3 miles.
So I did, running a loop through the forest preserve, as instructed, at a pleasantly comfortable pace. I measured the course with a watch that used Global Positioning Satellites overhead to precisely tell me how far I ran: 3.09 miles. Later that evening, one of the group leaders of the class I lectured to at a nearby high school confirmed the watch's accuracy.
It was one of five lectures I gave that week at five separate locations around the city of Chicago. Nearly 2,000 runners, most of them running their first marathons, had signed up for the class, which was sponsored by the Chicago Area Running Association. They did so partly to attend lectures such as mine, but also to participate in training runs on the weekend in a dozen different locations. Almost every one of those 2,000 runners would have run 3 miles that day and would do 7 miles on the weekend either because I had told them so in an e-mail message similar to the one I received, because they'd logged into my Web site to access my free training programs, or because they were following the program in this book (in an earlier edition).
I say this with some pride: hundreds of thousands of runners have run marathons using my training programs. Many have followed my novice program to finish their first marathon. Once having achieved that success, they often migrate upwards to use one of my intermediate or advanced programs, running more miles or adding speedwork to improve their times, to set personal records, even to qualify for the prestigious Boston Marathon, which accepts only runners who qualify by running fast times.
Dramatic Changes
The first edition of Marathon: The Ultimate Training Guide was published in 1993, but within a half dozen years, the sport of long-distance running had changed so dramatically, with more and more people running marathons, with more and more of them women, and with pacing teams and gels and computerized timing, that I felt a revision was necessary for the book to remain relevant. The second edition appeared in 1999, and now, a half dozen years later, the sport has taken another quantum leap into the future, demanding of me a third edition. Since the first two editions found their way into the hands of more than 120,000 eager readers, I had little difficulty convincing Rodale Press to allow me to update and revise my work
Certainly the e-mail message I and so many other runners had received that morning telling us to run 3 miles was part of the technological change that had come to the marathon in the new millennium. Add to that the GPS watch, which not only precisely measured the length of my run, but also allowed me to upload that and other data into my computer log after I returned home.
At my lectures throughout Chicago and its suburbs that week, I answered dozens of questions typically asked by first timers: "How can I expect to run 26 miles when your longest training run is only 20?" and "What's the best kind of cross-training?" or "Should I add weight lifting to my training routine?" Typical, so very typical, and I honestly don't object to answering them again and again because I respond to the joy (and fear) I see in the eyes of those training for their first marathons.
But new runners in Chicago and elsewhere need not wait for me to appear at a clinic near them. They could go online and access one of my free InterActive Training Forums to ask a question and receive a direct answer--often within minutes--from me and other experienced marathoners who surf intomy forums while at work or at home or at school or as a break from their daily routine. This is my "V-Team," a group of runners who enjoy the camaraderie that comes from communicating with other like-minded people. Looking for a training partner or course where you can run a planned 12-miler while visiting another city? You can find one online. I run one of the more popular online forums, often responding to several dozen questions a day, but I am not alone. There are other training programs available through the Internet, and many other coaches offer advice to beginners, free and for pay. In the past half dozen years, the Internet has dramatically changed how runners learn how to train for a marathon.
Also during this period since publication of the second edition of this book, there have been other, nontechnological changes in the sport. Marathons have continued to grow in size, Chicago being one of four world marathons (the others: New York, London, and Berlin) that attract fields larger than 30, runners. Within the United States, according to figures from the USATF Road Running Information Center, the number of runners finishing marathons has grown from 170, to 400, in two decades. Those finishers are slightly older and somewhat slower, their motivation in entering a marathon (often their first road race of any distance) being mainly to finish it, not to finish it fast.
In an article on the Forbes Magazine Web site titled "The Slowing of the Marathon," columnist Dan Ackman cited figures to show how dramatically marathon fields had slowed over a period of two decades. Male runners in the 1983 New York City Marathon had a median time of 3:41:49, an 8:27-minute-per-mile pace. Ten years later, they had slowed to 4:14:27, or a 9:43 pace. And 10 years after that, the median male time dropped further, to 4:28:41, or 10:25 per mile. "In other words," wrote Ackman, when the median 1983 runner was finishing the race, today's runner still had five miles to go."
Not everyone has welcomed this downward slide. The medical director of one major marathon in the Southwest described this phenomenon to Forbes as "the dumbing down of the marathon." He suggested that 10-minute pace was arguably not running, adding: "In a way, it's an insult to the distance."
Guaranteed Finish
I certainly disagree. Rather than its demonstrating the "dumbing down" of the marathon, I submit that the drop in median times might portend a "smarting up." Today's marathoners have slightly different goals from those of the preceding generation and certainly different from the generation before that. When I ran my first Boston Marathon, in 1959, I entered planning to win that race, or at least stay close to the leaders and finish near the front. I did stay close to those leaders for nearly two-thirds of the distance, but failed to finish. I repeated that dismal performance in the next two marathons I ran, running in the lead but not making it to the finish line. Finally, in my fourth attempt, I finished my first marathon in just under 3 hours, despite having walked most of the last several miles.
In contrast, among those enrolled in the CARA Marathon Training Class, the finishing rate is something like 99 percent. This is because members listen to me when I tell them to run their first marathon to have a good time rather than to run a fast time. This is one of the main themes of my lectures to first timers. I suggest they pick a time goal 1/2 hour slower than their potential because it guarantees two things: 1) they will finish the race with a smile on their face, enjoying the experience, and 2) if they ever run a second marathon, they will be guaranteed to set a personal record because they ran so slowly the first time.
Those words of advice never fail to cause appreciative laughter, but they are true. I wish someone had offered me that advice when I first ran Boston nearly a half century ago. I wish someone had written a book such as this, offering training advice. There were few marathon coaches when I got my start. I learned almost all I knew about running by trial and error: making a mistake in training or racing and then correcting it. Sometimes we have to find our own way to the finish line-although it helps if you have someone offering proper directions so you don't get lost.
That is the purpose of this third edition of this book. I want to show you the way to a comfortable finish if you are running your first marathon, or to an improved performance if that is your goal in a latter marathon. Please join me on the starting line.
Following is the list of chapters from the Table of Contents of Marathon: The Ultimate Training Guide:
Introduction: Marathoning for a new millennium
Chapter 1: The Mystique of the Marathon
Chapter 2: Learning to Love Running
Chapter 3: Your Very First Steps
Chapter 4: Different Views of the Marathon
Chapter 5: Your First 26-Miler
Chapter 6: Learning to Train Right
Chapter 7: Ten Truths About Marathon Achievement
Chapter 8: Striving to Improve
Chapter 9: Building Up Mileage
Chapter 10: Running Long
Chapter 11: Speedwork for Distance Runners
Chapter 12: Defensive Running Strategies
Chapter 13: August Injuries
Chapter 14: Planning for Peak Performance
Chapter 15: The Magic Taper
Chapter 16: The Distance Runner's Diet
Chapter 17: Achieving the Perfect Pace
Chapter 18: Race Day Logistics
Chapter 19: Drinking on the Run
Chapter 20: Mind Games
Chapter 21: Mile 27
Chapter 22: Finish Line
Appendix: Training Programs
"Marathoning for a New Millennium" appears in Marathon: The Ultimate Training Guide by Hal Higdon, Copyright © 2005 by Hal Higdon, all rights reserved. Autographed copies of this book are available from Roadrunner Press, 2815 Lake Shore Drive, Long Beach, IN 46360-1619.